Ponca City, Oklahoma (AP)—In a culmination of 50 years of theoretical speculation and weeks of intense media frenzy, two teams of researchers at the Fatherhood Institute for Research Nerds (FIRN) recently announced they had independently discovered evidence for the long-sought elementary particle that dictates behavior by dads and thus significantly impacts the family universe—the elemental unit popularly known as the “Dad Particle.”

To thunderous applause from a standing-room-only crowd of domestic behaviorists, journalists, and several unknown men from the soup kitchen across the street gathered at FIRN—as well as from other groups of fatherhood researchers around the world watching by webcast—the leaders of the two teams said they had definitely observed a particle they termed a “Riggs bison,” so named because this sub-atomic speck of matter found deep within the brains of fathers, interestingly enough, greatly resembles one-time tennis great Bobby Riggs riding an American bison.

Roger White

“We have now found the missing cornerstone of fatherhood physics,” said Rolf Molf, FIRN’s director general. “We indeed have a discovery. We have observed a new particle common to all fathers. This astounding breakthrough will give wives, mothers, daughters, sons, and anyone else who might give a rat’s behind some answers as to why fathers old and young do some of the amazingly dimwitted things they do. As to why this particle looks like Bobby Riggs riding a buffalo, we have no idea.”

“Bison,” interrupted Assistant Director General Haye Seed.

“Whatever,” Molf said.

If there proves to be one and only one Riggs bison, its discovery would provide confirmation of the so-called Standard Model of Dad Behavior. “It appears to us that this ‘Dad Particle’ determines fundamental fatherhood characteristics, such as affinity for lying horizontal on couches during weekends, slipping an extra fiver to a grounded daughter, and watching reruns of old football games ad nauseum,” said Molf. “On test subjects, we removed the Riggs buffalo and within days these men were shopping with their wives, asking directions from service stations, and actually limiting their beer intake to one or two cans on the weekend. It was remarkable.”

“Bison,” insisted Seed.

In 1964, two groups of dad theorists each proposed that the brain of the average American father is pervaded by a molasses-like field, now called the Riggs bison field. As fermions (father-like thoughts) pass through the field, they acquire mass. And a quite tasty molasses-like flavor, at that. Without this Riggs bison field, a dad’s tendency to, say, hog the remote, would literally fall apart; even a father’s boisterous belch would no longer exist.

One of the “fysicists,” (shortened from “fatherhood physicists”) Peter Short of the University of North Ponca City, predicted that if this field were hit by the right amount of estrogen energy, it would produce a unique phenomenon, which came to be known as the “knockdown drag-out.” Short was present at the FIRN announcement and said afterward: “For me, it is an incredible thing that has happened in my lifetime. Now, dads everywhere can point to this discovery and say, ‘See? It’s not my fault.’”

Discovery of the “Dad Particle” was made possible by the FIRN super collider, which took approximately an hour and a half to construct. Built atop the running track at Ponca City High School’s Wildcat Stadium, the super collider sends two dads, mounted on tricycles, in opposite directions on the 400-meter track. When the dads collide, at super-slow speed, their heads are then immediately examined via MRI. The MRI results are then X-rayed, and the result is then mimeographed and faxed to the press box.

“It was there, in the Wildcat Stadium press box, where speculation first took hold that the Riggs buffalo may have been found,” Molf said. “I still have goose bumps.”

“Bison,” Seed corrected.

Roger White is a freelance writer living in Oak Hill with his lovely wife, two precocious daughters, a very fat dachshund, and a self-absorbed cat. For further adventures, visit oldspouse.wordpress.com.